Fast food - essay

I don't know if you saw anything about Bush's joint press conference with Putin. I only saw some excerpts on Democracy Now. I must say it was embarrassing. Bush, when left on his own without teleprompters or wires or whatever is basically hopeless. He has no idea what he is talking about. He was asked a question about where the billions would come from to rebuild New Orleans, given the expenses of the so-called "war" in Iraq. He then launched into a truly sophomoric diatribe about how bad the devastation was, how hard it would be to rebuild, how complicated and difficult it all was, how the federal government would help, how racism would not enter into it, and blah, blah, blah. He never once answered the question other than to say, "we can do it." He has no idea that we will have to borrow more billions from China and Japan. Actually, he has no idea at all. He plain and simply has no understanding of anything. He is, in truth, the dimwit in charge. But not to worry, he has appointed that paragon of virtue, that experienced administrator, that genius of genius's, that rebuilder of cities, architect of spin, political animal par excellence, our saviour, Karl Rove to take charge of the rebuilding. I guess you know what that means (heh, heh, heh).

Anyway, here is an essay to take your mind away from more serious matters:





Fast Foods

I'm not one for fast foods. Indeed, I never eat them except under extreme duress from my young son who, of course, loves them. I like slow foods. I try to explain to him that fast foods are really not good for you. He doesn't care. Understandable enough in a young child. But what about all the adults that eat this stuff? Do they really not believe what they read about fast foods? Or is it, perhaps, that they don't read. Or, like my son, do they read but just not care. If you look carefully at the denizens of these ubiquitous eateries you are led to conclude that they probably don't care. Although I firmly believe fast foods are not good for you, that is not my primary concern here. It is their apparent competition to see which one can kill us first.
Take breakfast, for example. It used to be you could get ham and eggs or bacon and eggs and hashbrowns. If you wanted anything else you had to order it special. Nowadays they advertise, "two eggs, two strips of bacon, two sausages, and pancakes all for one low price." To add one final nail for your coffin they slop a huge dab of butter right in the middle of the pancakes and also give you a pitcher of syrup. I don't know if they throw in hashbrowns or not as I've never had the nerve to order one of these bargains. It's as if bacon and eggs, or sausage and eggs, or ham and eggs, alone, all fried, are not bad enough. Now, I notice, you can often get both ham and sausage or bacon and sausage instead of just one. No doubt they are concerned with your health and want you to eat hearty.
But these breakfast places pale into insignificance when it comes to burgers. Used to be you could get a hamburger, or even a cheeseburger, and a coke. The burger was usually served with a piece of lettuce, maybe even a slice of tomato. If you wanted fries you ordered them separately. Now, depending upon which one of these places you are in, you can get not one cheeseburger, but two, along with fries and a coke for, again, one low price. Some of them have also taken to adding a couple of slices of bacon to their cheeseburgers. Not to be outdone others offer four slices. Why don't they just give you a handgun? Let you get it over with quickly.
You probably have already heard about the great coconut oil scandal at the movie theaters. That is, the popcorn cooked in coconut oil, one of the most deadly substances of all for your health. They then add insult to injury by pouring melted butter all over it (if you can afford it, that is).
I don't even want to imagine what they cook french fries in.
And that's another thing. Frying. Most of these establishments know only one way to cook - deep frying. Thus, even when you order something good for you, like seafood, it comes fried. Fried shrimp, fried scallops, fried clams, fried catfish, fried oysters, fried cod, fried fish sticks, and invariably served with the everpresent French fries. Are people crazy or what? Is this the way they eat at home? Know they nothing at all of nutrition and health, cholesterol, heart attacks, obesity, even taste?
What is perhaps the worst problem with fast food restaurants is that your children love them and love to eat this junk to the point where they won't eat anything else. Child abuse, if you ask me. And of course the world is now being taken over by fast foods. We've exported it to virtually every corner of the globe. Even the French and Italians, god bless 'em, have fallen prey to this insidious international attempt to slowly kill us off. Fine restaurants are becoming a thing of the past. Try driving anywhere in the United States and finding anything decent to eat along the freeways. There are nothing but MacDonalds, Wendy's, Taco Bells, Arby's, IHOPS, KFC's, Burger King's, Taco Times, Jack-in-the-Boxes, and more, including pizza parlors, as far as the eye can see. Oh, no! Don't let me get started on pizza.
When the absolute best meal you can hope for is at Denny's or Red Lobster or Marie Callenders, you know you are living in a culture of the absurd. I fear there is no turning back.